Our nation is so warlike that we can hardly conceive of any other kind of glory or of honour than those won in the profession of arms. Hence it is that the greater number of Frenchmen of good birth apply themselves with zeal to the profession of arms in order that they may gain advancement therein, but they neglect the study of the various interests which divide Europe and which are a source of frequent wars. This inclination and natural application in our people result in a rich supply of good general officers, and we need have no surprise that it is considered that no gentleman of quality can receive a high command in the armies of the King who has not already passed through all these stages by which a soldier may equip himself for war.
But, alas, it is not the same with our negotiators. They are indeed rare among us because there has been in general no discipline nor fixed rules of the foreign service of his Majesty by which good citizens destined to become negotiators might instruct themselves in the knowledge necessary for this kind of employment. And indeed we find that instead of gradual promotion by degrees and by the evidence of proved capacity and experience, as is the case in the usages of war, one may see often men who have never left their own country, who have never applied themselves to the study of public affairs, being of meagre intelligence, appointed so to speak over-night to important embassies in countries of which they know neither the interests, the laws, the customs, the language, nor even the geographical situation. And yet I may hazard a guess that there is perhaps no employment in all his Majesty’s service more difficult to discharge than that of negotiation. It demands all the penetration, all the dexterity, all the suppleness which a man can well possess. It requires a widespread understanding and knowledge, and above all a correct and piercing discernment.
Diplomacy an Expert Craft.
It causes me no surprise that men who have embarked on this career for the sake of titles and emoluments, having not the least idea of the real duties of their post, have occasioned grave harm to the public interest during their apprenticeship to this service. These novices in negotiation become easily intoxicated with honours done in their person to the dignity of their royal master. They are like the ass in the fable who received for himself all the incense burned before the statue of the goddess which he bore on his back. This happens above all to those who are employed by a great monarch on missions to princes of a lower order, for they are apt to place in their addresses the most odious comparisons, as well as veiled threats, which are really only a mark of weakness. Such ambassadors do not fail to bring upon themselves the aversion of the court to which they are accredited, and they resemble heralds of arms rather than ambassadors whose principal aim is ever to maintain a good correspondence between their master and the princes to whom they are accredited. In all cases they should represent the power of their own sovereign as a means of maintaining and increasing that of the foreign court, instead of using it as an odious comparison designed to humiliate and contemn. These misfortunes and many others, which are the result of the lack of capacity and of the foolish conduct of many citizens employed by princes to deal with public affairs abroad, occasioned in me the belief that it is by no means impertinent to set down some observations on the manner of negotiating with sovereigns and with their ministers, on the qualities necessary for those who mean to adopt the profession of diplomacy, and on the means which wise princes will take to secure a good choice of men well adapted at once to the profession of negotiation and to the different countries where they may be sent. But before I take my subject in detail it is perhaps well that I should explain the use and the necessity for princes to maintain continual negotiation in the form of permanent embassies to all great states, both in neighbouring countries and in those more distant, in war as well as in peace.
The Usefulness of Negotiation.
To understand the permanent use of diplomacy and the necessity for continual negotiations, we must think of the states of which Europe is composed as being joined together by all kinds of necessary commerce, in such a way that they may be regarded as members of one Republic and that no considerable change can take place in any one of them without affecting the condition, or disturbing the peace, of all the others. The blunder of the smallest of sovereigns may indeed cast an apple of discord among all the greatest Powers, because there is no state so great which does not find it useful to have relations with the lesser states and to seek friends among the different parties of which even the smallest state is composed. History teems with the results of these conflicts which often have their beginnings in small events, easy to control or suppress at their birth, but which when grown in magnitude became the causes of long and bloody wars which have ravaged the principal states of Christendom. Now these actions and reactions between one state and another oblige the sagacious monarch and his ministers to maintain a continual process of diplomacy in all such states for the purpose of recording events as they occur and of reading their true meaning with diligence and exactitude. One may say that knowledge of this kind is one of the most important and necessary features of good government, because indeed the domestic peace of the state depends largely upon appropriate measures taken in its foreign service to make friends among well-disposed states, and by timely action to resist those who cherish hostile designs. There is indeed no prince so powerful that he can afford to neglect the assistance offered by a good alliance, in resisting the forces of hostile powers which are prompted by jealousy of his property to unite in a hostile coalition.
The Diplomat: An Agent of High Policy.
Now, the enlightened and assiduous negotiator serves not only to discover all projects and cabals by which coalitions may arise against his prince in the country where he is sent to negotiate, but also to dissipate their very beginnings by giving timely advice. It is easy to destroy even the greatest enterprises at their birth; and as they often require several springs to give them motion, it can hardly be possible for a hostile intrigue to ripen without knowledge of it coming to the ears of an attentive negotiator living in the place where it is being hatched. The able negotiator will know how to profit by the various dispositions and changes which arise in the country where he lives, not merely in order to frustrate designs hostile to the interests of his master, but also for the positive and fruitful purpose of bringing to an apt result those other designs which may work to his advantage. By his industry and application he may himself produce changes of opinion favourable to the office which he has to discharge; indeed, if he do but once in an apt moment catch the tide at the flood he may confer a benefit on his prince a hundredfold greater than any expense in treasure or personal effort which he may have put forth. Now if a monarch should wait, before sending his envoys to countries near and far, until important events occur—as for instance, until it is a question of hindering the conclusion of some treaty which confers advantage on an enemy Power, or a declaration of war against an ally which would deprive the monarch himself of the assistance of that very ally for other purposes—it will be found that the negotiators, sent thus at the eleventh hour on urgent occasions, have no time to explore the terrain or to study the habits of mind of the foreign court or to create the necessary liaisons or to change the course of events already in full flood, unless indeed they bring with them enormous sums whose disbursement must weigh heavily on the treasury of their master, and which run the risk, in truth, of being paid too late.
Cardinal Richelieu.
Cardinal Richelieu, whom I set before me as the model for all statesmen, to whom France owes a very great debt, maintained a system of unbroken diplomacy in all manner of countries, and beyond question he thus drew enormous advantage for his master. He bears witness to this truth in his own political testament, speaking thus:—